Translating Hugo : Le Poème du Jardin Des Plantes VIII c et IX

This post is a continuation of the eighth poem and the ninth of Hugo’s Le Poème du Jardin Des Plantes from L’art d’être Grand-Père. Only one more poem to go!! My English translation follows the original French version by Victor Hugo.

** And I dream. And I think I hear a dialogue
Between the dreadful tragedy and the églogue[i];
On one side is terror, and on the other love;
In neither of them is it still day;
The child seems to want to explain something;
The beast roars, and, monster inclined on the rose,
Listen … — who could understand, O firmament,
That which stutters in its roar?
Whomever is guilty of the secret, stands ups and meditates,
The blessed flower as well as the accursed thorn;
Everything becomes attentive, all thrills; a chill
Shakes the word, the branch, the bush,
And in the daylights and in the twilights,
In this shadow where the Hercules once fought,
Where the Bellérophon[ii] flew, where hovered
The immense Amos, shouting: a New World is Born!
We feel we do not know such sacred emotion,
And it is for nature which the eternal God created,
It is for all the mystery a tenderness,
As if we saw the dawn calming ray
To begin anew the unclear promontories,
When the white soul comes to speak to dark souls.

** The face of the beast is terrible; we want
To ignore it, the eternal problem dazzling
And dark, which man calls Nature;
We have before us the somber shadow, the adventure
And the yoke, the slave and rebellion,
When we see the frightening face of the lion;
The stormy monster, hoarse, frantic, he is not free,
O stupor! and what is this strange balance
Composed of splendor and horror -the universe,
Where reigns Jehovah whom Satan fears;
Where the stars, luminous and livid swarm,
Seem caught in a galley, and fleeing into the void,
And thrown at random as we throw the dice,
And always on the run and always escaping?
What is this marvel, frightful and divine,
Where, in Eden we see, it is the hell that one foresees,
Which eclipses; O terror, hopes vanished,
The infinity of suns under the infinity of nights,
Where in the clouds, God disappears and steps aside;
When they have before them the monster face to face,
The Magi, the dizzying dreamers of the woods,
Pale prophets who speak voices,
One senses that they do not know the enormity of the beast!
For them, the bitter grin of this obscure head,
It is the abyss, anxious to be highly regarded,
It is the eternal secret that wants to be kept
And who does not let in his mysteries
The curiosity of the solitary;
And these men, to whom the shadow confesses,
Feel that here the sphinx is irritated, and their hair
Stands up, and the blood in their veins freezes
Before the frown of the prodigy.

[i] An églogue is a poem in the classical style of a pastoral subject, also known as « bucolic ».

[ii] A Bellérophon is a hero of Greek mythology. He was “the greatest hero and slayer of monsters.

Copyright 2018. May be quoted in part or full only with attribution to Robyn Lowrie (www.frenchquest.com)

Follow Blog via Email

Meet the Author

College Professor with eighteen years teaching in English, French and ESL classrooms of diverse International environments. Focused on developing instructional methods to help students achieve linguistic and cultural proficiency in a second language classroom.
Ardent scholar of French history, literature and art. In addition, Content editor and Proofreader of Anthology texts and manuscripts for publishing. Translator of German and French texts.